Competitive Splatoon, will it take off?

[joetext]

Not much point in speculating right now, IMO. I think it depends on how interesting the game is at high-level play. There are certainly good players, but the game has only been out for a day, so nobody really knows what the competitive strategies are at this point. That being said, where there's a will there's a way.

 

[Sycho]

I think it will be like Mario kart and have a small niche competitive scene.

 

[Colino]

The community struggled to make competitive Melee thrive, and look where it's at, 14 years later.

I don't think that's a fair comparison at all. Melee became popular for a number of factors that Splatoon doesn't share, Offline play being one of the big ones.

 

[Colgate]

I don't think that's a fair comparison at all. Melee became popular for a number of factors that Splatoon doesn't share, Offline play being one of the big ones.

The point still stands. The community decides wether the game will be successful or not

Passion~

 

[Krozo]

I feel like as long as people love the game and play the game the competitive scene can take off. It also shouldn't be forced. I hear too many people trying to push it competitively so soon. PLAY IT FIRST. This game isn't competing with much since it is such a fresh form of the shooter. Let's let it flesh out before we force things. I, myself, hope that this game strives and lives up to some of the competitive gaming scenes out there (Melee specifically).

 

[dustmyte]

I feel the gameplay itself is sublime for competitive play.. I really hope it happens somehow, in spite of the odds.

 

[DigDeep]

Online, maybe. Depends how much everyone ends up liking Splatoon and wants it to stay alive. The general response has ranged from loving Splatoon to expecting to get bored of it in a week. It's way too early to say. Right now it's not looking good honestly, but I'd say it's unfair to start judging now and people should probably wait until ranked is an option which looks like it'll be here soon.

Local seems dead on impact. :/ Lack of LAN really sucks as it's gonna be a huge obstacle. Not sure if people would be passionate enough to have local tournies as that will be a lot of work. There's already an example of it messing up local tourney possibilities with Dismantle who had to cancel the Splatoon tourney and just have a showcase instead.

 

[breakfast]

I'd surely hope the scene takes off. It seems like Nintendo were trying to make a competitive shooter in the first place, but everything is a little iffy and it's too early to say. Japan looks as if it's going to have a huge scene, considering how the game is selling out all over there.

 

[Shinobi]

If Nintendo has an online tournament mode like in brawl/melee that would be helpful.

 

[Fusion]

Is it even possible to play locally aside from single player? Unless there is, it won't take off. Nintendo kind of shot themselves in the foot by not having local multiplayer.

 

[Colgate]

Is it even possible to play locally aside from single player? Unless there is, it won't take off. Nintendo kind of shot themselves in the foot by not having local multiplayer.

1v1 battle dojo

 

[LizardBuckler]

The point still stands. The community decides wether the game will be successful or not

Passion~

Community has a hand in a games lifespan, but the game itself is also a big factor. If Splatoon wants to last, it's going to need more varied gameplay. Melee lasted for 14 years, and is still growing, because it's a plausibly limitless game, and the meta has been dynamic for most of its lifespan. Brawl petered out real quick because its meta got figured out and the playerbase dwindled.

FPS's in general have less competitive potential than fighting games, just by design, but I don't think that will keep Splatoon from having a competitive community. Nintendo just needs to add more maps and weapons, while keeping the designs self explanatory.

Discussion on competitive viability and lifespan would greatly benefit from avoiding making comparisons to fighting games, though. Entirely different beasts.

 

[SmashCapps]

Okay, let's good at the game on its own merit and look at some of the issues that stand in its way to getting really big competitively.

The first part is the difficulty of local multiplayer. Now I know obviously we can all play online and the online for the game is VERY good but online scenes have issues. I was the largest TO for Playstation All Stars Battle Royale which had its scene almost entirely online. The issue here is that being online things aren't "real". I know that seems a weird statement, but people just don't connect as much and it's a LOT harder for people to take something not as physical seriously. It's also a lot harder to build hype. I've hosted online events for several games with over 100 people. A local gaming tournament would take those numbers and everyone would get excited, but online it just doesn't phase people.

Now we come to something that makes it even MORE difficult, streaming. How do you intend to show off 8 different screens enough to actually provide the proper kind of dynamic experience necessary to really show off the strategic elements of the game? Currently online this is 100% impossible, and there's no way to spectate even with silly things (ex killing one player in Smash Bros Online). Now live you'd need the possibility of 8 cameras or capture cards and the possibility of several computers. The needing possibly 8 consoles for ONE team match alone is going to become a serious detriment to anyone hosting events as well.

Now a game doesn't HAVE to be streamed to be successful, but without those real tangible things for people to see and watch the excitement factor dies a lot. You can say some team had a close match just now and list the percents, but without the visual story of how it got there it's just blah. In a game that is HIGHLY visual with covering areas in ink this is going to be even MORE important.

I know this one will apparently be patched in, but until we have the ability to pick our own teams when going into 4v4 matches the whole idea of really competing with all of the strategies it entails is pretty moot.

So can it be competitive? Absolutely. It just has a LOT of obstacles to overcome.

 

[Cuddlefish]

Splatoon probably won't have a competitive scene, but it will very likely get a sequel, and as a series, Splatoon has plenty of potential to maintain a competitive scene.

Whether or not the devs are willing to tap into that potential remains to be seen, but hopefully they'll actually listen to feedback from this game and take it into consideration with later entries.

 

[Grasp]

I can see Splatoon picking up a competitive scene, but I can't imagine it being a very large one. Right now, the game is still young and strategies are still being developed, but I can see where the game might hit that "stomp or be stomped" stage where the good players will know the tricks and the bad players will just get trounced, frustrated, then eventually quit. I can't tell if its that there just aren't that many players online or if the game has zero consideration towards grouping like levels to like levels in a match as opposed to dropping level 1's in with a group of 15's+ (when it comes to facing off against guys with 3+ effects per equipment, IT MATTERS) but currently a match can be mostly even, or completely one sided because the stars aligned and the pros got stuck on one side while the newbs got stuck on another.

In the long run, I can't see the game remaining hugely popular simply because there's going to be a player-erected barrier called the skill gap. If pre-mades are paired up against pub groups come August, this situation will only get worse. Chuck in some WTF moments from lag, and I can see people quitting a game they used to enjoy in disgust, simply because they're now spending more time waiting to respawn while the enemy paints the entire map their color.

As proof of this, I point to Planetside 2's air game, which has such a high skill floor most players that want to fly can't cut it. So the air game is generally emptyish, save for those "ace" pilots that shot down all those rookies to the point they're no longer interested in even trying. I expect the same concept to eventually apply to Splatoon. In CoD it's race around, see someone, left trigger, right trigger, target killed. In Splatoon, interaction with other players is a bit more involved than that, and that's where a lot of players will fall behind.

It's a fun game, the depth is there, but I fear Nintendo might need to recognize that the game's roster picker needs to weigh player stats in team make ups (or maybe it already does, it's just horrible at it.) And of course, prioritize throwing pre-mades against pre-mades come August. The game is only fun when the common player's average battle comes out to a maybe 10% difference in map coverage. Not surprisingly, while the pre-mades and skilled players might enjoy mass farming their victims, their victims do not like being farmed.

 

[WydrA]

Nintendo not only supports smash 4 but iirc melee and maybe even 64. Also Bill Trinen is already aware of squidboards' existence and gave us a shout out. They'll support us when the time comes, but we've got to support ourselves first. We need to be a community worth supporting. If we want to see competitive success, it starts with us.

 

[Technocrow]

I am hoping my very hardest that a big competitive scene will see the light of day. We already have this site for starters! I think as long as there is a high skill ceiling in which players can continue to develop the meta in years to come I think we Splatoon has a good chance. If the skill ceiling is low and there aren't many strategies or options for players willing to go those extra miles, "competitive" Splatoon will indefinitely decay until a sequel is released.

 

[PerfektNerD]

ALWAYS BELIEVE

It'll take off if we make the effort (and we have a reason to). We will overcome all obstacles, though requiring competitors to essentially bring their own consoles to local tournaments is NOT at all conducive...

Although DOTA and LOL are basically like that too.

 

[LizardBuckler]

Nintendo not only supports smash 4 but iirc melee and maybe even 64. Also Bill Trinen is already aware of squidboards' existence and gave us a shout out. They'll support us when the time comes, but we've got to support ourselves first. We need to be a community worth supporting. If we want to see competitive success, it starts with us.

Nintendo supports Smash 4, and Melee contextually. It's much more for positive publicity than sudden acceptance of the smash community in general, but that's its own deal. Again, comparisons to competitive fighters aren't conducive to good discussion on the topic.

I wouldn't think nintendo would set up tournaments for Splatoon though, simply because I don't think they are intending it to be competitive. If it does end up having a competitive scene, it'll have to be community run, with possibly, occasional nintendo tournaments, and (though unlikely) funding.

 

[WydrA]

Nintendo supports Smash 4, and Melee contextually. It's much more for positive publicity than sudden acceptance of the smash community in general, but that's its own deal. Again, comparisons to competitive fighters aren't conducive to good discussion on the topic.

I wouldn't think nintendo would set up tournaments for Splatoon though, simply because I don't think they are intending it to be competitive. If it does end up having a competitive scene, it'll have to be community run, with possibly, occasional nintendo tournaments, and (though unlikely) funding.

I seem to remember...
Yep here it is, took a little digging but I found it:
https://www.reddit.com/r/smashbros/...thoughts_on_some_of_apex_2015s_issues/coao8rr (In case you don't know how reddit works, press the "parent" link underneath the comment to see what it's responding. Repeat until you get the context you need (i would think you should only need to do it once or twice or this particular comment))

That's direct support. Despite what people like to say I do believe Nintendo has seen the value in sponsoring their games, and more importantly supporting the communities for their games however possible. We have it easy, we probably won't have to put in nearly as much work as the smash community to get their backing.